We Grew Up Too Fast
by Cindelina
Summary: Loki understands that this is real life. "We don't always get to be with the one that we love most. We just be with the one that we can love. " [Thorki]
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Hey there - this is my second fic for this fandom, but the first multi-chapter one. Greatest thanks to my beta and close friend, RosiePosieRW for sticking with me throughout the whole process of this fic, which had been sitting on my Drive for four months.  
Any reviews and constructive criticism would be greatly appreciated, and feel free to PM me with any queries and crap. I've rambled on long enough - hope you enjoy!

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CHAPTER ONE:

This is real life. We don't always get to be with the one that we love most. We just be with the one that we can love.

Loki detests the taste of smoke. But he loves the way it coils up at the bottom, strong and thick, but gradually becomes weak, thin, and blends, then disappears as if it were never there. He finds it beautiful, watching the colours mist into nothing. It's still there of course, but he just doesn't see any of it. Loki scoffs. Maybe it was a bit like him

He takes a long drag from the cigarette while leaning against the headboard of a bed not of his own. He tilts his head back and purses his lips, managing to blow a steady stream of smoke before coughing into his arm, eyes squeezed in discomfort. Next time, maybe he should just watch it burn. The sudden sound from earlier causes the body that lay beside him to stir and hook Loki's leg with his own.

"What's up?" he murmurs into the pillow, still half asleep and probably not willing to listen to his bed partner.

Loki stays quiet for a few seconds. "Nothing, Stark. Go back to sleep." he says, gently. But he didn't need to say it. Tony had already fallen asleep again.

Loki stays like that for a while. Time does not pass in his mind as his eyes glaze over, entranced by the smoke. Sometimes, he wishes that he could be like it, then laughs a little, thinking of a video game his brother always played.

'Where there is smoke, there is fire.'

Who was the fire, though?

He blinks. The smoke had stopped coming in a steady stream at the end of his cigarette. He crushes the end of the cigarette in the ashtray, putting it out. Sleep finally overcomes him. He pulls the covers over himself, and shuffled closer to the warmth of the man. Maybe not the one he loves most, but one he can love.

When Odin and Frigga first brought home 'a small bundle of joy', the elder of the two infants had learnt to run just a few months prior. Unfortunately, that meant that Thor spent his days running around the house, knocking vases off their allocated spaces, ruining perfectly-made beds, waking his parents up at six in the morning because he was simply unable to go back to sleep, or just generally being a huge (albeit loveable) nuisance to all those around him.

However, his parents were finally able to heave a great sigh of relief when instead of breaking things, Thor sat quietly, prodding at the small baby in the crib. He was fascinated, asking his parents questions like 'Where did he come from?', and 'He's my little brother?', then smiled so wide that he received the smallest of giggles from his own little brother.

Of course, at first, Odin and Frigga were slightly concerned that Thor's clumsy hands may just hurt his younger brother and only allowed the small boy to be around Loki if they were around. Disheartened, Thor resulted to tactics. Which really was to sit for long periods of time on his hands (ten minutes) staring at his parents and holding his breath (for thirty seconds) until he was gasping for breath. With a resigned look on their faces, Odin and Frigga opted to let Thor sit beside Loki's crib alone. That is, if he behaved well for the entire day.

Thor would soon find out that he was the type of person who was able to get whatever he wanted as long as he flashed a brilliant smile. But at a young age, he simply took it for granted and grinned back cheekily whenever Loki glared at him for pulling at his fingers, or poking his soft cheeks, or sneaking inside the nursery after his bedtime and waking his younger brother up.

Once Thor had reached the age of six, he realised Loki glared at him a lot. He'd always give him a nasty look when he'd interrupted him during the screening of The Teletubbies or when he was taking his daily nap. So during that hot summer where Thor had finally tired from running around in the sand and splashing sea water at his new 'friends', he jogged over to Loki who was scribbling something in a notebook under the shade of the umbrella. He sat there for a while, staring at Loki.

"Loki, do you hate me?"

He shrugged. A handful of sand cooled by the shade hit Thor's front.

"Dunno. Don't ask stupid questions"

Thor just took it as a 'no', too roused to think properly. With the biggest growl a six year old boy could produce, he tossed hot sand onto Loki's shorts, earning him a hiss and a small glare. Thor just laughed and ran away, feeling completely full of energy again.

He later found out that the water in his drink bottle had been replaced with wet sand. Thor swears to this day that he saw Loki smiling smugly around a forkful of his greens as his face went red.

He never got Loki back for that.

Weeks later when Thor's summer finally came to a close and he was able to enter primary school, he refused to take off his uniform. He modelled the rather unattractive clothing to his parents and Loki because he 'looked like a big boy' and kicked Loki's feet from under the table when he said it was a very ugly red. Thor just accused Loki of being a jealous sourpuss.

Maybe it was true (it was 100% true) proven by the obvious sulk that was spread over Loki's childish pout. Thor couldn't help himself from rubbing it in his brother's face even more as he strutted around the house in his rather baggy school uniform. When it got to the point where his whole family was rather tired and Loki pushed Thor - uniform and all- into the bathtub, he was finally stripped of his clothes by his younger brother.

Frigga thinks that the reason why this memory is permanently scorched into their brains is because it was the first time Thor cried in front of other people, except for his brother. The boys think it's because Odin had it framed and hung above their beds for five years until Loki moved out.

There used to be a park beside the Borsons' residence. Not used to - it's still there. The occasional jogger might run past, but they would definitely quicken their pace as they passed. It was more of an urban legend that had been passed around the town for the past few years, spread mainly from the primary school up the street. When one of the walls collapsed and fractured the leg of a small girl, a nine year old Thor (suddenly into the supernatural, his sketchbooks filled with way too many bad drawings of ghosts) freaked out and had his friends ("Sidekicks," a teacher once said) get worked up that it was the work of a spirit.

Naturally, all the parents just scoffed and considered it a child's excitement, still young and naive. That was until one of the town's less-known criminals, nicknamed 'Frostbite', had escaped from a low-security prison a few kilometers out and was found in the bathrooms of the park. His body wasn't found until a few days later, when one of the town's locals complained about the horrifying stench from one of the stalls.

The prison never noticed Frostbite's disappearance.

"What? You mean that your parents let you guys stay up after eleven?" A heavy thunk came from under the table, where Sif's bag now lay.

The young boy just laughs, then motions for his four friends to come in closer to hear his story. When he received the ever-so-common roll of his brother's eyes when he heard him from another table, to tell him that 'yes, that will be fine, you idiot'. Loki never actually told Thor that the 'idiot' was there, but he could almost hear the friendly jib rolling off his tongue.

"Guys, haven't we gone through this before?" he asked, faking exasperation but nevertheless being content with telling this story again and again. "Sometimes, my mum and dad are talking about something in the kitchen and my brother always knows when they're coming up. So I sleep whenever!"

"If Ms Marchel was to hear about this, you and your parents will receive an angry letter," Volstagg told him.

"What could she do about it? Cut off your hair?" Sif scoffed.

"You know very well what it's like to have your hair cut off," Loki retorted, eavesdropping as he passed by 'Thor and his loser friends'. The only reason, everyone thinks, that Loki does actually continue being a snide little prick is because that he knows he can talk (or cry) his way out of any situation.

Loki just smirked as the fork hit the wall and clattered to the ground, escaping into the confines of the school hallway. Just so he wouldn't have more hard, pointy things thrown at him.

They were wrong - Loki just learnt how to lie because he was a mischievous troublemaker. Or rather, just improved his lying. To him, lying was fun. It amused him to no ends just how much shit he could force people to believe if he just put on a fake smile and a confident air.

"Just how are the two of you related? You're a nice person and he's… that!" Sif banged her juice box onto the table, spilling some of the contents onto the plastic table. Volstagg and Thor mourned the waste of juice, because that was good juice.

"You talk about my brother like that and then waste juice?" he jokes, then once again becomes serious. "I'm not gonna lie - Loki can be an absolute ass sometimes. But I'll pinky swear you that he has a heart of gold. Or at least silver."

"Not sure about his heart, but tongue is most definitely made of silver," Fandral mused with a touch of envy.

"That he does." Thor's eyes crinkled as he smiled, remembering some of those hushed conversations on the rug that lay between their bed. They always kept the curtains open to let the soft glow of the moonlight illuminate the room instead of having themselves fumbling around in complete darkness. Loki never liked the dark anyway, always having to have a small book-light by his night stand. He only used it if Thor fell asleep before he did, disliking the feeling of being alone. Light offered him enough comfort.

A few nights earlier, before any cutlery was thrown at Loki in anger, the two boys sat in unease and discomfort as they heard the steadily rising voices of their parents in the kitchen below. Thor had already went down before, to retrieve a glass of milk for Loki who couldn't be bothered doing it himself. But instead, he was greeted with angry voices from his parents, voices that he didn't know his parents made. When Odin spotted the young boy, instead of the rational voice that had a powerful and demanding undertone, there was none of the rationality, but only the latter.

"Thor, what on Earth are you doing up this late?"

Before Thor could answer his question, Odin continued. "You should be in bed, young man, not scavenging about in the kitchen at ten for food,"

"Odin." Frigga's sharp voice cut through her husband's lecture. "Do not take your anger out on other people. Come Thor, let's go back to bed."

Odin showed signs of annoyance, but stayed silent, his one eye watching the two of them. Thor didn't need to worry about Loki being caught out of bed, as he was certain that his own footsteps were loud enough for his brother to hear. His mother trailed closely behind him, and Thor could feel the tension between them both.

"Mum?" He heard her take a deep breath before answering.

"Yes?"

"Why are you and dad angry?"

Frigga contemplated her answer for a while, not sure if she should tell him the truth or not. She knew, or at least though that Thor was too young to know about these things. It might have stressed him out or, god forbid, lead him into distrusting his parents. "We're just a little stressed right now. It's only temporary, don't worry."

Thor nodded. He was young, but he wasn't stupid - he noticed when people sugarcoated things.

The blond slid into his sheets when his mother shut the door and kissed both the boys on their foreheads. A few seconds passed and when they were certain their mother was on the bottom floor, they broke into quiet laughter, because Loki was so certain that Thor was in huge trouble and Thor was still a little worried that Loki wasn't going to be able to pull off his fake-sleep act again.

However, their temporary laughter was cut off when they heard steadily rising voices, this time much louder but still unable to make out the words.

Thor denied it the morning after (blaming it on ghosts), but Loki is certain that that night, when the arguing had temporarily quietened down, but then moved to the bedroom next to theirs, the elder of the two had pushed his own bed closer to Loki's. Thor said that even if he did do it (putting way too much emphasis on the word 'if' for it to be believable), he probably did it because his bed was much closer their parents rooms. Thor was a terrible liar, having almost always told the truth. Loki believes that Thor was scared. And Loki was scared himself, scared to admit that he was scared.

That's probably why he didn't spread the story around.


	2. Chapter 2

"Do you think mum and dad are gonna have a divorce?"

Loki was in the same classes as Thor, despite the latter being older ("The smart bastard," Thor always used to say with affection when describing Loki). Sometimes in English when they are forced to do an assignment on the most boring books, their teacher would pick out a word and make someone explain it. Annoying as that was, it did have some benefits.

Just kidding.

There were none; everybody hated it.

That day, she asked a question. "How does the poet show that the married couple is to divorce?" she had asked, then immediately picking Thor to answer the question. He answered the question with a question of his own.

"What's divorce?"

Some of the class remained impassive, while some rolled their eyes, and some pretended to know what it was and just shook their heads (Loki included). Queue a long tangent that went on until the end of the period. And at the end, a few classmates high-fived Thor for making the teacher forget about homework, not having time to assign any as well.

"Thor, don't ask questions that you know the answer to. It wastes my time," he groaned, flipping onto his back. He put his hand above his face, squinting to see it in the dark. He couldn't. At that moment, there was no sound coming from Thor's bed apart from the sound of his silent breathing. Unfortunately for oki, he couldn't hear it. Crap, is Thor still there? Or did the idiot fall off his bed and die? He better not be dead, or who else was he supposed to talk to? He mentally slapped himself for deciding to let their father keep their curtains closed. He should call out to Thor. Loki knew he was being stupid, because it has been eleven years and he has not died from a monster from the horror movie trailers he'd watched, but nonetheless, it still creeped him out.L

"Are you still there?" he said silently, not daring to move in case that tonight was the night that the monsters decided to enter his bedroom. He heard a childish laugh.

"Don't ask questions that you know the answer to. It wastes my time," Thor mimicked as he pounced on top of Loki's bed, managing to get a small squeal of surprise from him.

"Get off, you idiot!" he hissed, somewhat pissed that Thor had managed to trick him. Damn him for knowing his fear of the dark.

"Sorry, sorry. If you're so scared, your big brother will sleep with you," he teased, pulling the sheets off his brother, then smothering him with his chest. Loki gagged. How long has it been since Thor took a goddamn shower?

"Go to hell!" But he didn't kick Thor out of his bed, afraid that he would pull the prank on him again. (He had to admit, it was a _little _bit funny, but he'd still need to get revenge on him.) Thor's boyish laugh rang out from his body, and despite the kick to his leg (because "You were way too loud!" Loki complained), he appreciated this moment. It was rare that he and Loki were alone together and having fun. It was only in the night time, ever since their friendship groups diverged and they would receive weird glances if they were to walk down the hallway together.

It wasn't until they explicitly said that they were brothers that anybody had thought that they were in any way related. Loki would always call himself the black sheep of his family.

A couple of minutes after they stopped fidgeting and Loki stopped trying push Thor off his bed, they collapsed into a complete silence. They both knew that the other was awake and knew that the other knew that they were awake and that sounded weird in Thor's head so he decided not to think about that. Loki broke the silence.

"Are parents supposed to argue that much?" he murmured into Thor's shoulder, his eyelids beginning to feel heavy. Thor pretended to have fallen asleep and snored into Loki's hair, earning him an annoyed groan. Loki knew that his brother was awake, but decided not to question his silence.

Thor didn't want to answer. Deep down, he knew the answer, but in the end, he convinced himself that he didn't. He didn't think that they were supposed to.

When Thor's four (Hogun made that pun four too many times.) friends time had all come, as were shipped off to intermediate school somewhere down the country, Thor moped around for two days.

On the last day of school, the five of them parted with tears in their eyes. Some more than others. But as much as Hogun would deny it, at least a tear was shed that day and more than enough hugs given. Loki included.

He made sure to wipe off all the 'Thor' sweat. No way in hell was he going to let Thor hug him in public again.

Even Loki, with all his anti-social behaviours and few close friends, gave them a farewell without too much animosity.

He didn't even complain when Thor dragged him to his corner of his room and forced him to look at photos of his self-named friends, Sif and The Warriors Three (Loki would always call them Sif and The Foolish Three). Loki may've smiled, half-laughing, half-admiring Thor and his lackeys for the amount of dedication both of them put into their friendship, even going as far as making a silly album, a compilation of fond memories.

He didn't have anybody who he could do that with. Or rather, who he wanted to do it with. He could possibly get some mindless fools to create it with, but it wasn't worth the effort. Loki may be a boy of lies, but he can only keep the truth at heart.


	3. Chapter 3

"...he's been eleven!" _clap!_ "He's been twelve!" A much louder _clap!_. "He's been thirteen!" Those with an average lung capacity have dropped out by now. "...Now he's fourteen!" they all scream, and Loki winced. Really. All this drama, just for a birthday?

Thor spied his younger brother's skeptical expression, and ruffled his hair fondly. "Every party needs a party pooper, and that's why you were invited!" Thor laughs, wrapping his arm around Loki's shoulders. The latter wasn't amused.

"I was invited because I live with you and you would lose face if your own brother didn't turn up to your birthday party," he deadpanned, bringing a handful of food up to his face. He lied. He came here for the food also. Truth be told, if he were to be living on only one person's cooking for the rest of his life, without a single doubt, Loki would choose Frigga. Damn that woman and her wonderful lemon-flavoured cupcakes.

"Whatever you say, Loki," Thor calls after him, shaking his red solo cup filled with non-alcoholic beer. Thor had asked for some kind of drink. Odin, wanting to exert every single ounce of manliness out of his boys, had opted for beer. Of course, it had to be non-alcoholic.

No way was he going to have intoxicated teenagers on his property. Loki rolled his eyes and stuffed another couple of those lemony delicacies into his mouth. He lied again. He had a couple more. And a couple more. And a couple more, until he couldn't have a couple more. Until he left his backyard, leaving Thor with Sif and the self dubbed warriors to chat (They said they were in town. Liars. They travelled all the way here.). He headed off for the top floor, his parents bedroom, where Thor had forced Odin to stay in for the duration of the party because 'it's not cool having you dad in your backyard with cargo shorts and floral print shirts supervising'.

"Father." he said, announcing his presence and to get his father's attention.

Hunched over the screen of his laptop and massaging his temples, he replied. "Yes, Loki?"

"Where is mother? I need more of the cupcakes, Volstagg and Fandral are demanding more." he lied.

Odin pretended to think for a few seconds, and did not give himself away. "Your mother has opted to stay the night at her friend's house. In other words, not here," the man replied, simple and to the point. His face stayed impassive, but Loki swore that he saw a flitter through his father's eyes.

So in other words, he has no idea and Frigga said she decided to leave for a friends place. It was uncommon for his mother to miss such as important occasion to her, so Loki felt that something was wrong. He just couldn't put his finger on it - he realised that his parent's relationship was still strained, but he tried not to think about it.

But he just assumed that since Frigga just _was not here, _that Odin had done something wrong. And there were just so many questions that Loki wanted to ask his father; questions that he should not have needed to ask. Frigga was an orderly woman, and would almost always tell the boys if she were to leave them for a few days. And maybe Loki had been standing there too long, for his father narrowed his eyes at him. "Is there something wrong, Loki?"

Should he tell? Should he ask?

"Nothing, father. Sorry for disturbing you."

He would have needed to talk to his brother about this - who else could he trust to keep his secrets? After Thor had said his goodbyes to his friends again, this time with less tears, he was surprised to see his little brother already beginning to tidy the backyard. Thor had always seen Loki as someone who didn't like to get his hands dirty, and Loki would have wholeheartedly agreed.

"Brother, what are you doing?" he asked, expecting a response tinged with sarcasm.

"What does it look like? Cleaning, Sherlock Holmes. Now hurry up - there is something I need to talk to you about," he ordered, tossing an empty rubbish bag towards his brother's front. He caught it as the black plastic hit his chest.

"Is it urgent?"

Loki felt a twinge of guilt, hearing that disappointed tone in his brother's voice. After all, he was forcing him to clean up a mess that wasn't even his, and on his birthday, no less.

Loki internally slapped himself. This was important - don't let silly emotions get in your way.

"Very," Loki replied, scowling and putting on some rubber gloves as he saw unidentifiable black stuff on the table. Thor reluctantly began to follow Loki's lead and popped all the balloons to spite his brother, hoping to rouse a smile from that currently stoic face. He didn't manage to. Instead, his brother just picked up the sad remains of the brightly coloured balloons and tossed them into his rubbish bag.

When finally Thor stopped messing around and completed the tidy up (which really should not have taken that long, seeing that there was little trash lying around, having only his closest friends and Loki at the party), he lay on one of the deck chairs whilst Loki threw the bags into the large bin. What could Loki possibly want? Usually, he would have left the cleaning as late as possible, or when Frigga told them what a large mess it was and forced them to clean it up. Or rather, only Loki because today was Thor's special day. Then she'd smile lovingly at her boys. On Thor's face would be a look of glee, and on Loki's, it would be a look of utter mortification.

Thor would have always ended up helping Loki out, no matter what the circumstances were. Loki told him that he should stop being such a pushover. Thor said that he'd do his best. Loki just groaned.

Loki came back from his trip to the bin, then threw himself on the other deck chair, moaning in relief as he did so. He just sat there for a few minutes, breathing in and out. Thor wasn't sure what he was expected to do, so he decided to wait until Loki moved. So he waited. And waited. And eventually got bored, so he decided to poke his brother in the shoulder.

"Loki? What was it that you needed me to know so urgently?" he asked, shaking Loki gently.

Loki groaned, then thought for a few seconds, thinking about how to word this. "Mother has left the house.. he said slowly, testing how the words sounded in his mouth.

Thor furrowed his brow. "So?"

"Father knows not where she has gone. She didn't tell anybody."

"I guess that happens sometimes." Thor shrugged, but he was beginning to get a bit worried.

"But not on your birthday. You know how seriously she takes these things - she hasn't missed a single one since I could think," Loki rebutted.

Thor thought for an appropriate response. "You shouldn't always think about the negative. Maybe she just went on a little holiday."

Loki knew that it was unlikely, but he took his brother's words into account. Think more positive.

"Yeah. I just hope so."


	4. Chapter 4

"So much for thinking positive, Thor." Loki grimaced, stacking a pile of books into his own box. He glanced at his brother in the doorway, who gave him a little tentative smile.

A few years ago, when their parents deemed that two teenage boys in a single room was too much, they had decided to move Thor into the spare bedroom. Thor volunteered because Loki was too lazy to move out all his stuff. Unfortunately for the latter, he was still forced to help Thor move out because their relationship was one that was close. Loki has stolen several of Thor's clothes, to the point where they didn't even bother checking if the article of clothing was even their own.

It took hours, after much debate over which hoodie belonged to who. All that argument however, was pointless, as Thor ended up staying in Loki's room more often than he really should.

When Loki returned his brother's smile, he knew that in his heart, his brother was going to be there.

"My heart's shrunken so much, shrunken so small, you're the only one I can fit in there," Loki had said softly, one night when he had broken up with his first girlfriend. 'Puppy love', his father had called it, waving it away with his hand. "Do not fret about it son, you will soon understand."

While yes, Loki did eventually understand the woes of the disease called 'puppy love' that infected every young teenager, he most definitely did not go to his father for any sort of advice. It was hurtful, really, hearing his own father brush off his problems as if it were unimportant.

And maybe it was jealously, overhearing Odin open up much more to his older brother, listening to his problems with such an apt attention, instead of giving him any old sort of generic response, the type that people on the internet, claiming to have degrees in psychology would say.

Loki did hold this again his brother, but he wouldn't dare bring it up in a normal conversation, he would only bring it up if he were royally pissed, like that one time Thor put Nair in his shampoo and Loki had to wear a hat to school for the next couple of months. Or if he thought that Thor was acting like a spoilt brat, when in reality, he knew that he was one himself.

"Are you sure that this is your shirt?" Thor said, raising an eyebrow at the shirt that clearly had 'THOR' in messy scrawl on the tag of his shirt and turning it towards his brother. That was enough to break Loki out of his trance, and the uncomfortable expression on his face quickly morphed into one of mischief. A look that Thor saw much too often, but one that only he and his family could recognise.

"I'm absolutely certain." he said smoothly, with a smile. Loki reached for the red shirt, and Thor let his brother take it. Even at a time like this, when the relationship of pretty much the entire Borson residence's was strained, Thor was still able to bring a genuine smile to his brother's face by pressing the small things. Thor was seeing Loki _really _smiling less and less, so as his duty as big brother (not the one that watches), he made sure that Loki was happy.

Thor didn't even need to be asked to help with Loki throwing his possessions into boxes. "So far," Loki joked, "this is all I need in life. Four cardboard boxes and all that is in it."

"And an overbearing brother," Thor added, throwing another one of his t-shirts that he found in Loki's drawers into a box. Loki might have scowled because even if he was lazy, he was a person who needed it to be orderly to some extent. And damn would it be ugly all of his clothes ended up with Thor-wrinkles in all of them.

"Don't just throw them in there, or Patrick Star will end up with an ugly, wrinkled face." He crawled over to the shirt hanging on the edge of the cardboard box and quickly folding it.

"But it's extremely difficult to make him uglier than he already is," Thor laughed, lying down on the bed. Cleaning was tiring.

Loki followed his lead. "Are you talking about Patrick or you?" he teased, pressing an envelope into his brother's hands. "Read it when mother and I leave. Even if we are only moving to the other side of Auckland."

A comfortable silence fell between the two, after Thor complained that 'he was not as ugly as that pink starfish'.

"Loki."

He hummed.

"Do you think mother and father will let us see each other?"

"I overheard talk of them talking about sending us to boarding school."

"If they do, I would hope to have a cute girl as a roommate," Thor fantasised, laughing when Loki slapped his shoulder.

"I think they'd be too scared to have you around, Patrick."

Thor pretended to be sad, and skulked around on Loki's sheets. "Rude."

"Yeah, yeah, whatever." Loki rolled his eyes and threw a pillow at the currently sad mess on his bed. "I've got some crap to get from the attic."

"We have an attic?" Thor joked, the both of them refusing to enter it after reading a specific story.

"No. I'm going to the roof."

"Wait, what?" Thor's eyes widened he sat up quickly, still a bit groggy from just waking up. If his brother was going to fall down the goddamn house…

"Relax," Loki said behind him as he exited his room. "I'm just going to the attic."

"Oh good, I thought you were gonna cop out on me and make me pack your stuff for you when you're in hospital." Thor sighed in relief, but Loki was already gone.

When Loki came back again, Thor could sense a sort of gloom hanging onto him, evident by his pursed lips and the overly-tight grip on a black leather book. While Thor would admit that it wasn't uncommon for him to see his brother with a figurative stormcloud hovering over his head ("Because he's going through his emo phase, like Hogun," Sif taunted), Thor had known his brother long enough to tell the difference. Or at least when Loki wasn't trying so hard to hide it.

Next, he eyed the small leather bound book that Loki tried so desperately to hide under his not-big-enough cardigan.

"Brother, is there something wrong? You just look like you saw mother and father doing it one more time before they parted," he asked, adding a joke at the end to hopefully lighten the mood. He could have sworn that Loki winced when he had begun to speak, but he decided not to comment on it.

"Nothing. I think I can pack myself," he said slowly, tugging a shirt from underneath Thor, "Brother," he said, soon after. It was more like an afterthought. He tested and tasted the word in his mouth, similar to how he poised it as a question when he was a child. He said it and then studied his bro- Thor's face for any emotion.

All he could see was worry.

"Really? You still have quite a bit to do, and I'm free all evening."

"I'm good," he stated, shortly and simply.

"You su-"

"Yes, just leave already, you oaf."

When Loki left, he said not a word but simply subtly waved as he entered the car. Amongst the large cardboard boxes that weighed almost as much as Loki, Thor swore he saw the corner of the leather-bound photo album sticking out of his bag.

* * *

AN: that's all I've written, folks. I don't intend on finishing this off. Maybe in the future, but not any time soon.


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